Senses in Translation

Senses in Translation: Multispecies Assemblages for War Remnant Detection

Based primarily in Colombia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, two countries with growing dog demining industries, this project is a comparative analysis of the limits and possibilities of perception that enable human–dog assemblages to clear heterogenous war-contaminated territories. Empirically, I will conduct participant observation with various lay practitioners and their canines at the International Canine Demining Center of the Colombian National Army and the Global Training Center of the demining organization Norwegian People’s Aid. I will follow these practitioners and their dog partners as they experiment with practices, infrastructures, and technologies for the detection of explosive devices. Specifically, my project will address how humans and dogs use this set of apparatuses to translate and communicate the sensory worlds that each of them inhabits to optimize their joint detection labor. Through this ethnographic research, I am interested in exploring the emergence of a shared multispecies sensorial sphere.

Check my current research project, Suspicious Landscapes